Ray

XXXIV

LET’S get hot and cold, because, darling new thing, we’re going through the weeds and the woods and just the sliver of the moon comes in through the dead branches, and the running rabbits and squirrels are underneath and above. Henry David Thoreau is out there thinking, loping around. Louis Pasteur is out there racing with the bacteria.

We went to the planetarium in Jackson, Mississippi, my hometown. Elizabeth, Ray, Lee, and Teddy. Elizabeth is on the couch with her crocheting. Lee is reading her new bible, Proverbs. It’s raining out. We’ve cut the yard in the front, and the train whistle is hooting.

“A gentle answer quiets anger, but a harsh one stirs it up.”

“It is foolish to ignore what your father taught you. It is wise to accept correction.”

They say, “Dad, take it easy. Quit going so fast.”

My daughter has a secret friend named Fred, and my son Teddy has a secret friend named Jim.

We all sleep together in the big wooden four-poster where I grew up, tiny innocent arms and legs and imaginary friends on top.

Ike, Ken, Carol, and Ginger are at my ex-brother-in-law’s place, and I join them to fish at the wide kidney-shaped lake at the bottom of their rolling lawn. Dr. John and Dr. Ray trade a few compliments. John would give you the shirt off his back. It’s a shame my sister, Dot, isn’t with him anymore. There were differences. His wife, Mindy, is sweet and has Buffy and Moffit. I forgot to mention my beautiful nieces, Hannah Lynn and Maribeth. Everybody’s around and we are flying kites over the tall oaks, the Black Angus cattle are roaming comfortably in the taller weeds, and the geese control their placid squadrons.

Ike is a playwright and Ginger has just come back from Europe with her Gitanes, one of the essential deeds of young females. Looking back at the house, it’s a low wooden castle.